Mechanical locking of floor panels with a flexible tongue

A set of floor panels adapted to be locked to other panels mechanically, each panel having an edge portion with a sidewardly open groove, in which groove a tongue formed as a separate part is received, wherein the tongue is an extruded section and is bendable in a plane substantially parallel with a front face of the floor panel such that a part of the tongue is bent and resiliently displaced inside said groove in said plane during locking of one panel with another panel, and wherein

• the tongue includes an upper surface and a lower surface and an inclined sliding surface extending between the upper and lower surfaces,
• the another panel has an inclined sliding surface which cooperates with the inclined sliding surface of the tongue, and the inclined sliding surface of the another panel is configured to be initially above the sliding surface of the tongue during locking and then to be below the tongue when locking is completed, and
• wherein the floor panels are essentially identical, the floor panels comprising connectors which are integrated with the floor panels and adapted to connect a new floor panel to a first and a second floor panel, so that upper joint edges of said new and second floor panels in the connected state define a vertical plane
• a first connector being designed to connect said new floor panel with said second floor panel in a horizontal direction perpendicular to said vertical plane and a second connector being designed to connect said new floor panel with said second floor panel in a vertical direction parallel to the vertical plane,
• the second connector comprises the tongue which is a flexible tongue and which is received in the sidewardly open groove in one of the new or the second floor panel,
• the sidewardly open groove is formed in an edge of the panel and is open towards the vertical plane,
• the flexible tongue has a length direction along the joint edges, a width in the horizontal plane perpendicular to the length and a thickness in the vertical direction, the flexible tongue is designed to cooperate, in a connected state with a tongue groove in the other of the new or the second floor panel,
• the first connector comprises a locking strip which projects from said vertical plane in the second panel and carries a locking element,
• said locking strip is designed to cooperate, in a connected state, with a downward open locking groove of the new floor panel, and
• the new floor panel is adapted to be locked to the first and second floor panels with vertical folding along the vertical plane, vertical folding being where a side edge of the new floorboard is pressed against an upper part of a second side edge of the first floorboard and when the new floorboard is angled down the flexible tongue side edge is folded down into a connection with the side edge of the second floorboard.